My Mother The Scientist, My Father The Warrior
by infy
Summary: A collection of Miriel/Vaike/Laurent-centered drabbles all about probably the most interesting family dynamic there is.
1. Apparitions

He held his stuffed animal tightly against his chest, ghosting slowly down the hall, and attempting to stay his tears. He winced at the pervading light from whatever candles and lamps in the hallway remained lit—so accustomed to darkness in the past few hours, both in mind and in ambiance. Shoving his face into the stuffed bear he held closely to him, shallow breaths took him to the room where his parents slept soundly.

"M-mother…" he whimpered, barely loud enough that even he could hear it, and she remained asleep. His father rolled over slightly. "Mother…" he said again, louder this time, and she let out a breath, lifting her head from her pillow for a moment before glancing over at him.

"Laurent, dear…" she muttered, stretching slightly. "To what end would you be up walking around at this hour…?"

He attempted to speak, but his throat tightened and it only came out as a small squeak.

His father stirred slightly, sitting up on his elbows. "Wh… what is it…?"

Miriel took a breath, eyes still trained on Laurent, before glancing behind her at her husband, who slowly ran a hand through his hair. "I don't know," she murmured, training her gaze back onto her young son. "What ails you, dear…?"

His shivers ran through him harshly, racking his small frame with tremors as he clutched his bear closer to him. All he could manage to choke out through the tightness throughout his body was a quiet, "n-nightmare…"

Miriel furrowed her brow, letting out a sympathetic sigh along with a slight smile of relief upon the realization that that was all it was. Holding out a hand, she beckoned her son over to her with a comforting "Come here." And he slowly stumbled over to her, falling into her arms and burying his head in her shoulder without a word beyond a slight hiccup, the aftereffects of his cries. She held him tightly, lifting him onto her lap as he held onto her with all the energy he could muster. Miriel glanced over at her husband with a furrowed brow, both her arms wrapped tightly around her shivering son. "Vaike…" she muttered, concerned, and her husband's expression reciprocated her anxiety.

Vaike ruffled Laurent's hair, speaking to him in his most reassuring voice. "Hey, buddy… when I was a kid and I had nightmares, it always helped to talk about 'em. What did you dream about…?"

The boy could only choke out a few words, and the horror they instilled in both Miriel and Vaike was palpable in the room.

"G-Grima… a-and Robin…"

The two of them stared at each other, wide-eyed in shock, neither of them knowing what to say. Laurent should know of none of that. He'd never even met his future self, let alone heard stories about the fell dragon. So then, how…

No. That didn't matter. For now, all that Miriel felt she needed to do was comfort her little boy, whatever that meant saying or doing. She held him tightly, gently shushing him, reassuring him that it was nothing more than an apparition derived from his somatic state and that he was perfectly safe with his parents there. Even then Laurent refused to let go of her, his eyes wide in terror, failing to lock on to anything but space. She kept casting glances over at Vaike, half out of a need to gauge his reaction, and half out of hope that he would have any idea how to comfort their son through the worst night terror that Miriel had ever seen him have. Vaike was equally clueless, but eventually caught his son's attention. "Would it make ya feel a little better if you spent the night with us, junior?"

Laurent reached out to his father in response, and Miriel passed the boy over to him, clearing a spot between the two of them for Laurent to sleep—it was only after a few more minutes that he was able to let go of Vaike as well, nuzzling himself into the space between his parents, and another few minutes before he finally managed to doze off.

Once he did, Vaike was the first to speak. "Of all the things to dream about, right…?" He murmured, running his fingers through the sleeping Laurent's hair. Miriel's eyes never averted away from her son.

"There should be no conceivable way that he could have known about it… dreams are indeed strange phenomena, Vaike. Apparitions of that nature are generally kept in the subconscious, but even then, he would have had to have known about Grima somehow to actually subconsciously create the vision," she whispered, furrowing her brow and removing Laurent's glasses from his face, placing them neatly next to hers on the table beside them. "The question remains, then… how in the world did he discover what Robin was…?"

"She couldn't have told him, could she? I mean, she wouldn't…" Vaike murmured, laying back down and crossing his arms over his forehead. "We told her not to." Miriel bit her lip and drew out a long "hmm…" before Vaike glanced over in her direction. "Your gears are turnin', Miri. What'cha got goin' on in that head 'a yours?"

"This is scientifically improbable, but then again, so is time travel and a colossal dragon destroying the world as we know it, so…"

"So…?"

"I postulate that somehow, both Laurents being in this frame of existence at one time, considering they have the exact same genetic makeup and came from generally the same place," she motioned to herself. "Perhaps… what if they somehow manage to share memories?"

"That's… crazy…? They never met."Vaike raised an incredulous eyebrow.

"You're serious? Good heavens, I had absolutely no idea! And does The Almighty Omniscient Vaike have a better explanation?" She spat, inhaling sharply once the words escaped her. After a moment of silence, of Vaike staring at her in wonder as to whether she meant what she said, she let out a sigh. "M-my apologies. I… shouldn't have snapped like that."

"Hey, babe, listen," Vaike rolled over, reaching over to take her hand. "The Vaike knows you love our son. Maybe this is something you can't… you can't change, y'know?"

Miriel blinked, wiping a stray tear or two away with her fingers. "Perhaps not, but… perchance it's this blasted maternal instinct, but I just… I want to protect him. And if I can't, then…"

"You ain't ever been one to concentrate on the what-if. Right now, our kid's sittin' right here, sleepin' like a baby," Vaike sighed, lightly shutting his eyes. "You always said what's goin' on right now is the part what's scientifically significant or whatever, and that's what's goin' on right now. So relax. He'll be okay."

Miriel took a deep breath, exhaling through her nose and finally laying down close to Laurent. "I suppose…" she began, shutting her eyes slightly and curling an arm around her son. "I suppose you have a reasonable point, then."

"As long as he's got his mom and pop he'll be fine, right? The Vaike at least ain't lettin' anything happen to his son," he leaned in slightly and touched her cheek with his hand, placing a soft kiss on Miriel's forehead. "Or his wife."

A slight smile spread across her face as she sighed one more time, covering his hand with her own light touch. "I wholeheartedly appreciate it, Vaike… and, for what it's worth, I as well will strive to protect this family."

Vaike, too, finally shut his eyes, drawing his hand away from her face and draping an arm across his wife's waist, "I know you will, babe," being the last thing he managed to mumble before drifting back off to sleep.


	2. Wordlessly

According to multiple confidential studies with stratified random samples derived from those married couples registered with the Ylissian census, this is an activity that approximately 98.4% of married couples engage in on their wedding night, so all things considered, it shouldn't have been much of a surprise when he brought up the topic. Nonetheless, she found herself slightly flustered for some unknown reason when he kissed her with a bit more fire packed into it than he usually did. She supposed she simply expected him to bring it up verbally as opposed to physically. But, actions do speak louder than words.

Her eyes opened slightly as they parted after a few fleeting moments, a thin trail of saliva still threading them together, and her mouth opened slightly to say something to him. Any sort of attempt at speech she made was rendered pointless, her lips so close to his that they grazed each other as she attempted speech. Her hands grasped his shoulders, not pushing him back, but rather firmly holding him in place. But no words would come.

Vaike didn't so much as blink-a smile painted his face but he never broke eye contact. She felt her face grow warm even from him staring at her that way. Even despite her not having even reached the beginnings of a sentence, she simply trailed off, finding it easier to just lay there with him, taking in the fleeting touches he passed to her with his lips and his hands without a word. Vaike touched his forehead to hers, eyes shut as well, and he leaned her back onto the pillow, poising himself over her.

Miriel shifted beneath him, her hands still shelving themselves on his shoulders, lightly shutting her eyes when he leaned in, placing light kisses along her jaw. Her mind trailed off for a moment before regaining her train of thought, and her heart raced. As she tried to compose herself, she noticed a warmth throughout her body, one so uncomfortable in the most comforting way possible; a shiver ran through her body when he lightly sucked on her earlobe and she let out a breath of air. There were no words that needed to be said. The massive vocabulary of the shepherd who prided herself on her ability to speak in all manners at any time was rendered to little more than soft moans at the touch of his skin on hers.

His lips shifted away from her skin and he managed to look her in the eye, that mischievous glint in it that always seemed to say just what she wanted it to. Their eyes met without ebb for as long as she felt they needed to but only a fraction of how long she was content in staring into them-her hands slid away from his shoulders, wrapping her arms around him and pulling him into another kiss. As they parted, the words finally reached her head and she managed to push them past her tongue despite the difficulty.

"Shall we begin our lesson for today, Teach?"

A slight lick of his fingers, and he leaned over and pinched the wick of the candle serving as the only light in the room, and it went dark, enough that Miriel had no way of knowing what his next move was going to be. Strangely enough, she knew everywhere he was planning on going, and he didn't have to say a word beyond "Class is in session."


	3. Trapped

Vaike had always harbored a sort of quiet understanding that when Miriel was holding a book, she had literally zero interest in advances of any sort, including those of a romantic, friendly, or antagonistic nature. The best course of action in these particular cases would be to either leave her completely and totally alone or engage her in intelligent conversation in regard to whatever it was she was reading, and Vaike was unfortunately lacking in any sort of ability to even attempt the latter. Unfortunately, his deficit brainpower also prevented him from quite grasping that she wasn't constantly in the mood for romantic nothings. What a pain. It had eluded him until recently how important all that smarty-genius stuff was to her when she was in the middle of it, so this was the first time he had actually attempted to leave her be when she was reading. He had gone off instead to do a bit of training of his own, maybe bug Laurent for a bit or something (unfortunately the boy was nowhere to be found, probably eggheading it up somewhere like his mom). It had been a good hour of complete separation from literally everything before Vaike had heard the sound of his wife clearing her throat behind him, and he greeted her with the customary wide grin, slight wave, and an enthusiastic "heya, baby!"

"Where have you been?" was Miriel's only reply, slightly catching Vaike off-guard.

"T-training…?" He stammered. Shit. Why am I in trouble now?!

A relatively disappointed but poorly hidden "Tch…" escaped Miriel's lips, and she adjusted her glasses before explaining herself. "I should explicate matters to elucidate my thought process on the matter." Clearing her throat, she turned a bit to hide the slight dusting of pink on her cheeks. "I have observed your behavior in the past, simply put, and have discovered that you seem to be much more forthcoming with romantic and sexual advances when I am preoccupied with a book." Vaike raised an eyebrow, not quite understanding what she meant—she apparently caught onto this after a few moments, and as she usually does when she is embarrassed or flustered, she absentmindedly gripped the sides of her hat, pulling it down slightly over her face. "T-to further explain, a-analogically, if one were to bait a trap with meat, surely a bear would come lumbering by and fall into the trap, yes?"

Vaike's lips upturned slightly. "The Vaike's gotcha, I think. Sneaky though, tryin' to get me to bother you while you were workin'." He found himself smiling wider at the sight of her peeking out at him from under the wide brim of her hat, an obvious blush darkening her cheeks. He tossed his axe aside, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her closer, and she smiled slightly as he did so. "Next time though, baby, how 'bout you just outright tell me when you want a little lesson from Teach, huh?"

"On the contrary," she smiled, wrapping her arms around him as well and raising a mischievous eyebrow. "I believe it is I who has imparted my knowledge to Teach on the subject in the past rather than the inverse. Observe." And with that, she held him tight and kissed him hard, enough to back him slightly, and after a moment's worth of registering exactly what was occurring, Vaike returned the favor.


	4. Poles

It was common knowledge among those with Miriel's background that the positive pole on a magnetically charged object will find itself attracted to the negative pole on an object with an equal magnetic charge. She had applied this in terms of the physical and literal for purposes directly related to scientific pursuits, but she had never thought to apply it to her own social relationships. Not until he breathed those words to her.

"I guess you'd be a bit more careful, eh, Mir…? Opposites attract, y'know…"

It had been in response to her desperate interrogation of him, in a horrified, angered voice she hadn't ever used before (and a subconscious borrowing of Sully's vernacular), about why he was so reckless, about why the bloody hell he decided to rush into battle like a gods-damned idiot when… when… "You… you know I'm…"

He grasped at her hand as if it was the most precious thing he could think of, and she leaned over to make it easier for him to speak to her without exerting himself. The axe that had won him countless battles, the one that he paid top dollar for, the one that he refused to part with no matter which weapon that tactician gave him, lay on the ground, covered in blood and tossed aside, completely untouched. "Yeah… yeah, I know, babe. I'm so…" His voice broke as he squeezed her hand, and she blinked stray tears from her eyes. "I'm so sorry…"

The sound of his breathing became labored and the shock of the deadly blow to his body began to subside. Blood began soaking the ground underneath them, soaking the knees of Miriel's pants as she knelt beside him. He shifted, gritting his teeth as he suppressed the searing pain ripping through him. He was losing blood, fading fast, and Miriel could only sit and watch. The wetness growing in Vaike's eyes was something she never thought she would ever have to see or endure—she thanked the gods silently that her tears were fogging her glasses, otherwise she didn't think she would be able to sit there and watch the thing she treasured most slowly fade away.

"Tell him all kinds a' stories about… about who his dad was, okay…?"

"I will." Her eyes shut tightly, and she squeezed his hand, unable to hold back her horrified tears. "I promise, Vaike, I'll tell him all about you."

With the slightest raise of her lids, she made out the form of her husband as his lungs took one final intake of breath, and shut them again in heaving sobs at the sound of his voice, soft and gentle and weak, withering away as he spoke. "I… love… you…"

The only thing she could manage to say in time before the feeling of their magnetism fading away was a softly muttered "I love you too, Vaike," and a squeeze of his hand.

A positive force attracts towards a negative force. Of basic magnetic attraction, that much she was certain. But it wasn't until her chest began to heave in uncontrollable sobs as she held his body closer to hers that she discovered the horrible reality—that in the absence of a negative force, the positive force begins to dissipate. And at that moment, Miriel discovered her charge had become completely neutral.


End file.
